For all you Tolkein/Lord of the Rings fans
Tolkein: Maker of Middle-Earth
" “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” With these words the Oxford professor J.R.R. Tolkien ignited a fervid spark in generations of readers. From the children’s classic The Hobbit to the epic The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien’s adventurous tales of hobbits and elves, dwarves and wizards have introduced millions to the rich history of Middle-earth. Going beyond literature, Tolkien’s Middle-earth is a world complete with its own languages and histories. Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth celebrates the man and his creation. The exhibition will be the most extensive public display of original Tolkien material for several generations. Drawn from the collections of the Tolkien Archive at the Bodleian Library (Oxford), Marquette University Libraries (Milwaukee), the Morgan, and private lenders, the exhibition will include family photographs and memorabilia, Tolkien’s original illustrations, maps, draft manuscripts, and designs related to The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion."

opps, somehow missed this one, but still two months left to get up to NYC.
Andy Warhol: From A to B and Back Again
Few American artists are as ever-present and instantly recognizable as Andy Warhol (1928–1987). Through his carefully cultivated persona and willingness to experiment with non-traditional art-making techniques, Warhol understood the growing power of images in contemporary life and helped to expand the role of the artist in society. This exhibition—the first Warhol retrospective organized by a U.S. institution since 1989—reconsiders the work of one of the most inventive, influential, and important American artists. Building on a wealth of new materials, research and scholarship that has emerged since the artist’s untimely death in 1987, this exhibition reveals new complexities about the Warhol we think we know, and introduces a Warhol for the 21st century.

MOMA is one of the finest modern-art museums in the world, accommodating 2.8-million visitors in 2016, which was #13 in the world that year.
In Midtown, it houses such masterpieces as "The Bather" by Paul Cezanne, "The Starry Night" by Vincent Van Gogh, "The Dance (1)" by Henri Matisse, "The Dream" by Henri Rousseau, and many, many more.

Opening today at the Guggenheim, a two part, year-long exhibit of work by Robert Mapplethorpe.
Implicit Tensions: Mapplethorpe Now
January 25–July 10, 2019
July 24, 2019–January 5, 2020
"In the thirty years since his death, Robert Mapplethorpe (1946–1989) has become a cultural icon. One of the most critically acclaimed and controversial American artists of the late twentieth century, Mapplethorpe is widely known for daring imagery that deliberately transgresses social mores, and for the censorship debates that transpired around his work in the United States during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Yet the driving force behind his artistic ethos was an obsession with perfection that he bought to bear on his approach to each of his subjects.
In 1993, the Guggenheim received a generous gift of approximately two hundred photographs and unique objects from the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, initiating the museum’s photography collection. Today, the Guggenheim celebrates the sustained legacy of the artist’s work with a yearlong exhibition program conceived in two sequential parts and presented in the museum’s Mapplethorpe Gallery on Tower Level 4.
The first part of Implicit Tensions (January 25–July 10, 2019) features highlights from the Guggenheim’s in-depth Mapplethorpe holdings, including early Polaroids, collages, and mixed-media constructions; iconic, classicizing photographs of male and female nudes; floral still lifes; portraits of artists, celebrities, and acquaintances; explicit depictions of New York’s underground S&M scene; and searingly honest self-portraits.
The second part of Implicit Tensions (July 24, 2019–January 5, 2020) will address Mapplethorpe’s complex legacy in the field of contemporary art. A focused selection of his photographs will be on view alongside works by artists in the Guggenheim’s collection, including Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Lyle Ashton Harris, Glenn Ligon, Zanele Muholi, Catherine Opie, and Paul Mpagi Sepuya.
This exhibition is organized by Lauren Hinkson, Associate Curator, Collections, and Susan Thompson, Associate Curator, with Levi Prombaum, Curatorial Assistant, Collections."

iPhone users, follow these steps to create a Manhattan Dining Guide quasi-app:1) Enter the URL of the next post (the actual Dining Guide), and bring it up on your iPhone - you can get the URL by clicking on the very-faint icon that looks like a "less-than sign (<)" at the top-right of any given post.
2) Tap the plus sign (+) on the bottom of your iPhone screen.3) Push "Add Bookmark."Voila! Your own free quasi-app in less than 30 seconds! --- Please feel free to contact me with any typos, suggestions, corrections, or comments. In order to ensure future access to this dining guide, simply become a participating member of donrockwell.com. Go back and read the previous sentence ten times: none of the restaurants covered in this guide serve a free lunch, and there is a very high likelihood that this guide will revert to being a reward for our participating members even though that means limiting readership (which, by definition, makes this website less popular). Our members - the ones who post here - are our life-blood, and they deserve to be rewarded for their efforts. It's very easy to sit back with a cup of coffee and read through all the content here; it takes effort to write and add content, and I want our participating members to know how much I appreciate them - I can't say it enough. Please register, post in the Please Introduce Yourselves thread, and then know that your simple actions have just supported this website which cannot go on without you - it takes less than five minutes, it's absolutely free, and your information is safeguarded and remains private. And if you're already a participating member, allow me to say thank you - the best thing you can do for us is to tell a friend about donrockwell.com (again, another simple action that only takes a few minutes).
This Manhattan Dining Guide will be in order roughly south-to-north, west-to-east, using the twin towers as my inspiration for a starting point - my own "ground zero," if you will. It will largely be alphabetized within region; as soon I as get more confidence in either my own rating capabilities, or find a local version of Don Rockwell (anybody out there?), then we can think about a ranking system like we have in Washington, DC; until then, you'll at least have a convenient, geographically based list. Enjoy it! You have the best restaurants in the United States.
Cheers,
Rocks

For anyone traveling up to NYC during the holidays or in the New Year.
Hilma af Klint: Paintings for the Future
"When Hilma af Klint began creating radically abstract paintings in 1906, they were like little that had been seen before: bold, colorful, and untethered from any recognizable references to the physical world. It was years before Vasily Kandinsky, Kazimir Malevich, Piet Mondrian, and others would take similar strides to rid their own artwork of representational content. Yet while many of her better-known contemporaries published manifestos and exhibited widely, af Klint kept her groundbreaking paintings largely private. She rarely exhibited them and, convinced the world was not yet ready to understand her work, stipulated that it not be shown for twenty years following her death. Ultimately, her work was all but unseen until 1986, and only over the subsequent three decades have her paintings and works on paper begun to receive serious attention."

MrB and I will be spending a long weekend in NYC in July. We used to go to NY fairly frequently, but haven't been in a number of years, so we're not up-to-date on restaurants. Looking for dinner, lunch and brunch suggestions for casual places as opposed to fancy. Preference for restaurants that take reservations. We'll be staying in Midtown. Would appreciate your suggestions. Thanks!

When I was in my teens, I had one, and only one, favorite rock singer: David Bowie. He was the solo act which twisted, and turned, and seemed the most complex to me, while at the same time being just a pleasure to listen to, and he was there at the right time.
Rest in peace, David.

Brenner's first time on "The Tonight Show" in 1971:
Brenner, among other things, reflects on that performance in 2013. Wow, you talk about a deep, reflective opine - what he's saying extends far beyond stand-up comedy, but for *every* aspiring stand-up comedian, this is required viewing. In just eight minutes, he touches on a lot of fascinating things - Brenner was a true comic pioneer who really lived the transition from old-school to new-school:

My knowledge of mid-19th-century Manhattan is something approaching zero. I had absolutely no idea about the gang wars of the 1840s (likewise Five Points), nor Blackwell's Island, nor the nefarious activity that occurred during the 1860s (some of it also at Five Points), and in this regard, "Gangs of New York" does a good job at teaching this important, yet little known, part of American History. I can't sit here and claim it's faithful to the truth, when I don't even know what the truth is, but it seems like it's at least trying to be.
Yes, Martin Scorsese is going to throw in some drama, but that doesn't mean the history lesson is worthless; just embellished.
Let me warn you, before writing any spoilers, that this is a very long and difficult film to follow - you'll be doing yourself a favor to write down names, positions, actors, or have the Wikipedia window open if you're watching it on your computer - otherwise, you might easily get confused. I did all this and *still* got confused, so be mindful. If you get lost (and don't be ashamed if you do), there's a very thorough synopsis on IMDB.com.
*** SPOILER ALERT ***
It's surprising that Liam Neeson ("Priest" Vallon, Amsterdam Vallon's (Leonardo DiCaprio's) father) is killed off so early in the film, but that does set the stage for the rest of the movie. Plus with other major stars such as William Cutting (Daniel Day-Lewis), and Jenny Everdeane (Cameron Diaz), this might have saved some on what must have been substantial salary costs (*)
Speaking of history, I find it both fascinating and timely that Abraham Lincoln's Conscription Act of 1863 - the first-ever mandatory draft for American men - could be circumvented either by paying $300, or by finding a suitable substitute (this is both in the film, but also occurred in real-life). Needless to say, this caused a great deal of civil unrest, as accusations were made that wealthier people could avoid the draft, whereas poorer people were stuck with it - the more things change, the more they stay the same.
It's amazing to me how Amsterdam had the wits about him to sell the recently killed corpse to medical science (it's even more amazing to me how that ended up in the papers, considering the transaction was made in complete secrecy). Notice the tribute paid to Nosferatu in the newspaper article - the drawing of the man second-from-the-right - even the man on the far-right has similar ears:
My goodness - I just realized I'm only forty minutes into this film, and I have over two hours remaining.
Ha! I knew when they were talking about Jenny (Cameron Diaz) being a "turtledove," that it was Martin Scorsese making a cameo as a wealthy homeowner.
(*) Interesting - when I was confirming that about Scorsese, I also read that both DiCaprio and Scorsese both took salary reductions to preserve the budget.
Huh! And shortly afterwards, Horace Greeley (Michael Byrne) makes a formidable appearance. Here's an interesting piece of information about the 1872 Presidential Election (it's too important to be called "trivia."). Likewise, P.T. Barnum (Roger Ashton-Griffiths) makes a significant appearance in the movie.
Wikipedia describes "Gangs of New York" as an "epic period drama," and that it certainly is. Who would know that the New York City Draft Riots of 1863 were the largest civil and racial insurrection in American history, aside from the Civil War - I certainly didn't, and wouldn't have if I hadn't watched this film. For this reason alone, the film is worth watching - I'm not even sure I knew this film even existed (it was released four months after Karen died, and I only have a vague recollection of the Space Shuttle Columbia explosion - I mean, I have a memory of noticing the headlines when it happened, but I didn't care, and know almost nothing about it (contrast to the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion, which was one of the few incidents during my lifetime that I remember where I was when I heard the news (some others being the O.J. Simpson Trial, the World Trade Center attacks, the Apollo 11 moon landing, and Martin Luther King's assassination).
"Gangs of New York" may not be to everyone's taste, but there's no denying that it's an important, historical film, and one which I will remember for a long time. It's so long (2'45") that you *must* be dragged into its atmosphere if you're going to watch it, and you're unlikely to forget it for that reason alone. To show how out of touch I was with life during that time period, I've never even heard of "Chicago," which won the Best Picture Academy Award that year.

Have you been watching Colbert lately? Over the last couple of weeks, for the first time, The Late Show has better ratings than The Tonight Show. His monologues are funny yet pointed.
His take on the Flynn fiasco:
it's funny cause it's treason
"Sean Spicer, the M.C. Escher of bullshit." LOL

It's ridiculous that we don't have a thread for Mark Slater, a personal friend of mine, and donrockwell.com Member #14.
Aside from Mark being exceptionally gifted as a a fine-dining sommelier - both in terms of maintaining a wine list, and in establishing a rapport with customers - I have had the pleasure of dining with him on many occasions, and he has an excellent palate.
In 2007, he won the James Beard Foundation's national award for "Outstanding Wine Service" while he was sommelier at Citronelle.
One thing many people don't know about Mark is that he studied harpsichord in Vienna, Austria, and is an accomplished harpsichordist. Having seen him play many times, I can verify that he is an outstanding sight reader, which is an incredibly difficult and underrated skill to develop and possess. His sub-specialty is early Rennaissance music, but he can handle most any work for harpsichord, and is a good enough sight reader to "fool" the listener into thinking he knows a piece, when it's actually the first time he's ever looked at it.
Mark doesn't know I'm writing this, and may ask me to take it down, but I'm not going to - he deserves widespread recognition as one of the most important, influential figures in Washington, DC restaurant history - certainly when it comes to wine. At this point, he is truly the Patriarch of all area sommeliers, and should be recognized as such by all those who follow in his footsteps, both now and in the future.

What do you say about Kareem Abdul-Jabbar?
Not much. You just bow your head in thanks that you got to live during his lifetime.
03/29/15 - "Why I Converted to Islam" by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on america.aljazeera.com

I'm taking my kids to NYC for a quick trip later this month. I think I've got our schedule roughly mapped out, making our meals my next step. I'm looking for any recommendations y'all can offer! I'll be with my 6 and 8 year old boys who are, on the whole well behaved and fairly adventurous eaters for their age but we won't be at Le Bernardin.
1. Sunday Brunch, either near our hotel in the Upper East Side or near One World Trade. I was thinking maybe Balthazar's. I used to love this spot in the late 90s/early '00s but 20 years later, is it still worth a stop or is my nostalgia getting the better of me?
2. Sunday dinner. No real restrictions in location here but I'd like somewhere with great food since its our only dinner. We may go see a show that night so perhaps somewhere near Central Park South? I don't want to eat in Times Square.
3. Monday morning Best NYC Bagels. The kids haven't really had bagels (other than Bodo's in Charlottesville) because we don't really eat them around here so I'd like to introduce them to a really great bagel.
I greatly appreciate any recommendations! Many Thanks!!

Carmen McRae was a great jazz musician, not merely a singer. Here she sings "Round Midnight," the Thelonious Monk tune. Carmen was a life-long advocate for Monk's work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzX_4ncaNjs

The Studio Museum in Harlem is a contemporary art museum dedicated to African-American artists. Galleries span two floors with several lofted spaces. The museum runs several artist shows concurrently, the current shows end March 8, 2015 and the next shows open March 26, 2015 (so best to check their website before visiting). Suggested admission is $7 and Sundays are free. Located along historic 125th Street in Harlem, the Studio Museum is near the Apollo Theater and other Harlem landmarks.

I'd love to give you all a review of the art at the Guggenheim, but in the FAQ fine print they note that luggage is not checkable.
So...if you have a few hours to kill in New York City after you arrive or before you leave, and you decide that a museum visit is in order, check their luggage policy (apparently most NYC museums are not luggage friendly).
We found out the crappy way.
For the record, we had no problems checking luggage at the Art Institute of Chicago last year and spent a lovely couple of hours there in between our hotel check out and our flight back to DC.
It appears the National Gallery of Art allows limited luggage checking. Not that I often wander the streets of DC with luggage going to museums.

My dinner club is tomorrow night. We always include a pre-dinner cocktail and I settled on a take on this twist on a Manhattan because lord knows I love my Luxardo:
2 oz. bourbon (or rye whiskey – take your pick) 1/2 oz. sweet vermouth 1/4 oz. maraschino liqueur 2 dashes orange bitters Bourbon-Bathed Cherry for garnish
except that I planned to use Punt e Mes instead of sweet vermouth based on some reading I did and garnish with a pickled sour cherry because I have them. Figured I'd keep the cherry theme going by using cherry bitters instead of orange, but hadn't settled on that (is anyone crying yet at this total abomination ).
Anyway, I went to the Mo Co liquor store (my first bad call, but I am really pressed for time and it was on my way home from doing something else) to get the only ingredient I didn't have, the Punt e Mes and of course they didn't have it. So under pressure I had to pick a sweet vermouth. Thinking M&R couldn't be good for that money, I picked up the bottle of Noilly Prat (they had no Dolin or anything else of better quality). Then I got back to my desk and starting looking online and immediately regretted my decision.
So now I am contemplating driving out of my way to get what I originally wanted and having to return the Noilly Prat later. This it stupid. I should let it go. It's not important in the end. But I am a perfectionist. Someone please talk me down!!

We're cruising from NYC on Sunday 9/2. Need some place that serves lunch (not frou frou brunch with all you can drink mimosas) for a party of 8. Can't be too formal as we'll have our infant and 2.5 year old. Italian, Portugeuse, Greek, Spanish, French, or interesting Asian joints? What about Lincoln? Maybe a Boulud joint?
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[The following posts have been split into separate threads:
Lupa Osteria Romana (dcs)]